I've been lurking on this thread a while and would possibly like to see a spin off thread started with reposts or links to a few nuggets in this thread. In a world of diversity of resources, parity will always be an issue and how one deals with that is very important and a worthwhile discussion.
Now, my interest is focused along the lines of Lil' Lavery point in that resolution to this issue is to reduce the degree of disparity and not by bringing other teams down or by limiting what a mentor or sponsor can do to support the development of a robot design. A distinguishing feature of FRC is that there are very few limits to how elegant a design can be. Great robots are inspriring to many. I am interested in knowing what is needed to bring other teams up a notch or two.
Having just helped organize the brand new Alamo Regional, it was difficult to explain to VIPS new to FIRST why immediately after opening ceremonies on Friday that we only had 4 or 5 robots on the field and one of them wasn't doing much. Very anti-climatic. This regional planning committee and folks associated with FIRST in Texas began team sustainability discussions immediately after grant money was found to grow both FTC and FRC in Texas.
I appretiate the posts by JVN, Karthic, Paul Copoli as they describe how their teams work. One can never have enough engineers and of sufficient variety but just how many is needed and of what type. What are the key pre-season activities in which the mentors and students engage?
I probably have a few ideas in this regard since I've spent 10 years building two teams without lots of resources and still struggle to get everything built before ship date. Having input on paper from other sources from successful teams may help turn the tide here in Texas to a point where we have more "A" teams than "C-". Everyone wants to be at an event where any group of three teams can win matchs against another group of three. Sometimes the game helps in that regard and IMHO why Lil Lavery is able to pull match video from 2009 of younger teams playing a smart game and winning against seasoned veterans.
So my call to action is to any self-described quality team to post a white paper, reference to a white paper or reply to this thread or creat another with what mentoring resources you have, what on-site equipment you have and what kinds of shop support and then what kinds of things you do before the build season begins to maximize success on the field and in the CA judging. Key in that discussion is how the mentors interact with the students. i.e. Paul writes that 80% of the CAD work is performed by students but 100% is reviewed by himself. What other critical design elements are 100% reviewed by a key volunteer or group of mentors. How is code tested? Are students required to submit wiring schematics and present electrical/power load analysis. (if they have Al as a mentor I be they do
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I've seen a few of these posts in the past and if someone has the time to pull them all together into a single document, I would be extremely grateful or maybe post a word document with url links to existing white papers on this subject...